Before Christmas we had a look at the PCTVs Broadway 2T, a router that doubled as a streaming device for your TV. But while the 2T is a powerful piece of equipment, it's not exactly compact or portable.

Which is why we thought we'd take a look at the nanoStick solo, a USB stick that does a similar job to the Broadway 2T (no set top box compatibility though, of course), but at a much lower price and also, being a USB stick, it's got the advantage of being the size of a USB stick.

The nanoStick plugs into your laptop or PC and allows you to watch television. To receive the (fully paid for) television broadcast signal you can either plug your house aerial into the stick, or it also come packaged with a small portable aerial of its own that you can use. Being situated on the top floor of a building in Shepherd's Bush, we found the portable aerial to be more than suitable, although you basement dwellers may have some problems.

Either way, once you've plugged the stick in and got the software up and running (takes a bit of time to figure out the finer details, as the provided manual is a bit useless) the nanoStick works perfectly. We had no problem watching Cash In The Attic or Loose Women (unfortunately) and the picture was sharp and unpixelated on our laptop.

Connecting your iPhone or Android to the device takes a little bit more fiddling around, but as long as you have a good internet connection with the phone and a good signal originally, the quality should be perfect.

Unfortunately there are a few downsides to using the stick. Firstly, it only has free-to-air non-HD channels, and no way to easily attach in to a set-top-box. Secondly, this particular model only works with PCs (although there is a Mac version available, albeit with no iPhone support, strangely) and thirdly, while the portable aerial is pretty good for a portable aerial, it's not really suitable for use on the go. 

Essentially, the nanoStick is a fine piece of hardware if you want to watch TV on your computer or mobile phone, and it's also ideal for those who are short of space. However, if you're looking to watch TV on a train or car, that's where the nanoStick falls down, and so you may just have to stick with your legally downloaded recordings.